PI Newswire

The BBC spent £310,000 on private investigators between 2005 and 2011, director general Mark Thompson has revealed at the Leveson inquiry.

Thompson admitted at the inquiry on Monday that the BBC had used the convicted investigator Steve Whittamore and that the corporation has sought to get confidential information from the DVLA concerning the owner of a vehicle.

He said he believed there was a “strong public interest justification” for using Whittamore, who pleaded guilty in 2005 to illegally obtaining and disclosing information under the Data Protection Act.

The investigator was used by the BBC in 2001 when it was researching whether paedophiles convicted in the UK were able to or getting jobs where they would have access to or contact with children in other countries. At the time the corporation needed to establish whether “a known paedophile” was on a particular flight.

Thompson told Lord Justice Leveson the corporation had also used private investigator on one occasion to establish the ownership of a vehicle. Again, Thompson said the journalist involved “genuinely believed and with good reason that he was following someone who was involved … in a serious criminal conspiracy” and this justified the request for confidential information.

Read more…

Please find the top 25 news stories, current events, professional opinion and insights aggregated by PI Newswire for the week ending January 22, 2012. As always there are many great articles ranging from the bizarre to educational with everything else in-between. We encourage you to comment and share your thoughts, opinions and experiences. Enjoy, have a wonderful week & stay safe!

Vote NO on HB 1006!! http://bit.ly/yJx5ic

Anonymous Goes on Megaupload Revenge Spree: DoJ, RIAA, MPAA, and Universal Music All
Offline http://bit.ly/xS7Rnx

Free Software Blocks Keyloggers by Encrypting Keystrokes http://bit.ly/xmZZ7y

Cops: Jailed man smuggled gun in rectum http://bit.ly/z626A9

Do Women Cheat As Much As Men Do? http://bit.ly/AlRlNB

Man wants a job with FBI, instead gets 80 months in jail for child pornography http://bit.ly/wHnSZd

Controversy – but no charges – for coroner, private investigator for soliciting 17 year old autistic boy http://bit.ly/xLbNIP

The ‘toys’ that let you spy on the neighbours – new ‘Wi-Spi’ helicopter and ‘Intruder’ car offer hi-tech surveillance http://bit.ly/zUPrfb

Hidden Camera Inside Houston Precinct 1 Sheds Light on Police Probe http://bit.ly/wkHIIt

Should You Be Able To Sue Your Spouse’s Lover? http://bit.ly/AuTJnb

Eight officers resign over illegal searches of dozens of people using police files http://bit.ly/yt33hq

65 Year Old Woman Gets on Plane With Handgun in Purse: Passengers Furious With TSA http://bit.ly/wcwjuj

Forensic Apps for First Responders http://bit.ly/zdHZQE

Process Server Serves Lawsuit on Lindsay Lohan for Helping Kill Osama Bin Laden http://bit.ly/yujVu7

Air bag DNA foils insurance scam http://bit.ly/xwecQR

‘Boot up the backside camp’: Training female bodyguards Chinese style http://bit.ly/A0JiQ3

Background checks encouraged for online dating http://bit.ly/A5BN2G

NSA constructs hardened Android with super-spook mobile OS, available to the world http://bit.ly/yRyVHn

JP Morgan Chase Process Server Unable to Serve OJ Simpson Foreclosure Papers http://bit.ly/x7mhjq

Pepsi Pays 3 Million: EEOC Finds Hiring Discrimination against African Americans with Background Check Policy http://bit.ly/A1xShi

Police, Private Investigator Unable to Locate Missing Saudi Chemical Engineering Student Studying in Canada http://bit.ly/zlNdlr

Sex, spies and Mounties: the poisoned culture of the RCMP’s `Special O’ surveillance squad http://bit.ly/xTvefn

Ashton Kutcher Foursquare hack witnessed by millions of Twitter users http://bit.ly/zvLN4O

Bail Bondman & ‘Beat Down Posse’ leader convicted of racketeering and more http://bit.ly/xkLh1S

Google Abandons Anonymous Accounts With New Signup Form http://bit.ly/wRTEbJ

High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut & paste the article. See our Ts&Cs and Copyright Policy for more detail. Email ftsales.support@ft.com to buy additional rights. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/442bfac4-4382-11e1-9f28-00144feab49a.html#ixzz1kFRTGmDi

A senior director at Areva, France’s state-owned nuclear champion, has confirmed that he did hire a Swiss intelligence firm to examine its disastrous €1.8bn purchase of a uranium miner but denied that it was part of a plot against Anne Lauvergeon, the company’s former chief executive.

Ms Lauvergeon, known as “Atomic Anne” after 10 years at the helm of one of the world’s leading nuclear manufacturers, shocked the French business and political elite this week when she accused her former employers of spying on her and claimed that she had been victim to a long-running “plot” to destabilise her, directed from the “highest levels of the state”.

High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut & paste the article. See our Ts&Cs and Copyright Policy for more detail. Email ftsales.support@ft.com to buy additional rights. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/442bfac4-4382-11e1-9f28-00144feab49a.html#ixzz1kFRYdKYz

Sébastien de Montessus, head of Areva’s mining activities, said on Friday that he had indeed hired a Swiss private investigator, Alp Services, to look into the 2007 purchase of Uramin without telling Ms Lauvergeon, his boss at the time.

In an interview with Le Figaro newspaper he insisted that he instigated the probe last year to examine the deal, not to investigate Ms Lauvergeon personally, and that he had not sanctioned “spying” activities, such as wire-tapping her husband’s phones, against his boss.

Ms Lauvergeon and her husband have launched legal action in Paris over alleged illegal activities by the investigators, including claims of phone-tapping and accessing private documents. Mr de Montessus said that he stopped working with Alp Services in September once concerns were raised.

Ms Lauvergeon, one of France’s only senior businesswomen, was ousted last year by Nicolas Sarkozy, the country’s president. This followed a bitter tussle over leadership of the industry between herself and Henri Proglio, chief executive of EDF, France’s nuclear energy supplier, and a friend of Mr Sarkozy.

Read more…

Something didn’t seem quite right to Tyler Adams as he talked with the man who wanted to buy a gun from him.

The customer admitted he did not have a permit to carry a concealed weapon in Tennessee.

When Adams probed a bit more and asked if he could pass a background check, the guy was upfront and said no.

Adams did not sell the gun.

That’s the way the law is supposed to work for private sellers who, unlike gun dealers, aren’t required to conduct background checks.
But critics are skeptical that all private gun sellers would be that responsible, and say, in fact, the government leaves the door wide open for private sellers to sell a gun to anyone who is willing to pay for it and simply look the other way even if they are suspicious about the buyer.

Read more…

A report has found workplace fraud is costing Canada’s small and medium enterprises (SMEs) at least $3.2 billion a year – probably much more – and is hurting employee morale, just as the authors of the report say the problem is growing.

About 290,000 SMEs were victims of one or more instances of work-place fraud in the past year, says a Certified General Accountants Association of Canada (CGA-Canada) study.

Tim Houghton, vice-president of risk solutions for CKR Global Risk Solutions in Calgary, says 75 per cent of all employee-related crimes – theft, fraud, assaults and others – go unnoticed.

Houghton says a company is 15 times more likely to have an employee steal from an employer versus a non-employee. “If you consider that 75 per cent (of all crimes) go unreported, then that $3.2 billion is actually a quarter of the actual loss,” he says.

“It has a huge impact, both financially and non-financially, for most (SMEs).”

Read more…

Controversy is building around the Morgan County coroner.

I-Team 8 has exclusive details into why some are calling for him to be removed from office, and why he quietly left the Morgan County Sheriff’s Department.

Garry Long’s personal website touts his “26 years serving Morgan County.” It highlights a career that includes being a Morgan County detective sergeant, an investigator for the Major Crimes Task Force, a member of the Fraternal Order of Police. He’s also the county coroner, an elected official.

However, Facebook messages to a 17 –year-old autistic boy tell a different story.

The boy asks: “were r u at”

Long responds: “I’m at home, upstairs in the man cave. Where do you want me to be?”

Read more…

Paparazzi, underhanded spouses and sneaky private investigators have much to fear from a ground-breaking decision that gives individuals a legal weapon against intrusions into their privacy.

Experts say the Ontario Court of Appeal judgment that created a right to sue for “intrusion upon seclusion” will send a chill through anyone who snoops, hacks or uses confidential information to create mischief.

The decision also poses a threat to companies that fail to safeguard their customers’ private information or allow it to be used for unintended purposes, Toronto lawyer Scott Hutchinson said.

“If you have a breach of privacy on a large scale, I can foresee class actions where damages become quite significant,” Mr. Hutchison said. “This decision gives individuals a real tool with which to assert their privacy interests in a way that will capture the attention of private custodians of information.”

The decision permitted a Toronto woman, Sandra Jones, to sue a fellow Bank of Montreal employee, Winnie Tsige, for allegedly gaining improper access to Ms. Jones’s banking records on 174 occasions over a four-year period. At the time, Ms. Tsige had been in a common-law relationship with Ms. Jones’s former husband.

Read more…

It was a 65 year old North Texas woman who caused the security breach at Dallas-Fort Worth Airport.

She left the airport police station without commenting.

“We found her on the plane and took her into custody. She had a handgun in her possession in her handbag”, said airport spokesman David Magana.

Around 6:20 Wednesday morning, the woman went through a checkpoint at Terminal D. She grabbed her bag and left.

It was then that a TSA worker detected the handgun.

But the TSA says the woman grabbed the bag and left before the screening process was finished.

Read more…

The Saudi Arabian government is investigating the mysterious disappearance of one of its citizens studying in Saskatoon.

Hamza Alsharief, a chemical engineering student at the University of Saskatchewan, has been missing since Dec. 14. The 23-year-old moved to Canada three years ago, first to Edmonton and then to Saskatoon, says the lawyer for the Saudi Arabian Embassy in Ottawa. Alsharief ‘s last known contact was on the telephone with his sister who is studying in Ontario. He was supposed to spend the Christmas holidays with her.

“It’s frustrating,” said embassy lawyer Gar Knutson after a meeting with Saskatoon police on Wednesday afternoon.

“They don’t have any firm evidence of where the young man might have disappeared to. There’s a number of leads that they’re following up on, but there’s a number of them that have come up empty.”

Saudi Ambassador Osamah Al Sanosi Ahmad and a private investigator hired by the embassy also attended the meeting with Saskatoon police senior officers and Mayor Don Atchison, chair of the police commission.

Read more…

Victorea Florea alleged in a civil complaint in Puerto Rico that two private investigators illegally obtained offshore bank records. As reported on Fred L. Abrams’ Asset Search Blog, private investigator Nicole Bocra and Terry L. Gilbeau, a Certified Fraud Examiner and California attorney, allegedly conspired to access offshore bank records in Puerto Rico.

According to the complaint, the bank accounts that Bocra and Gilbeau reportedly found could not be substantiated by the banks. The “evidence” that Bocra and Gilbeau provided allegedly did “not exist and was ‘created’ to tum a profit.” See the case summary below for additional information.

Gilbeau Linked to Convicted Fraudster

This is not the first time it has been alleged that Terry Gilbeau has obtained bank records illegally. According to a recent Forbes article, two-time fraudster Barry Minkow used Gilbeau’s services to obtain confidential information about alleged bank accounts in the Cayman Islands and Switzerland. Minkow used this information when he accused two officers of Lennar Corp. of illegally diverting funds into these “secret bank accounts.” Gilbeau reportedly testified that he got the information orally from another investigator, whose name he (conveniently) could not recall.

Minkow is now serving a five-year jail term after pleading guilty to spreading false allegations about Lennar.

Read more…

A top foreign official, the Saudi Arabian Ambassador, made a special trip to Saskatoon Wednesday. But Ambassador Osamah al Sanosi Ahmad wasn’t visiting the bridge city under happy circumstances.

He met with Saskatoon police to discuss the disappearance of a University of Saskatchewan student, from Saudi Arabia.

Student Hamza al Sherief disappeared last month without a trace. The Saudi embassy is stepping up its efforts to help police find out what happened.

The Ambassador for the Embassy of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia says his country will spare no expense to help find one of their students who went missing in Saskatoon more than a month ago.

“I came here to meet with the mayor and the police to emphasize the importance of sparing no efforts in trying to find anything, any clue, any leads, to know what happened to him,” says al Sanosi Ahmad.

Read more…

News Corp.’s U.K. publishing unit has stopped using private detectives in the aftermath of the phone-hacking scandal, Tom Mockridge, News International’s chief executive officer, told a media inquiry.

Reporters must get permission to use investigators and he hasn’t approved any requests, Mockridge told the judge-led inquiry into press ethics today. The company has come under fire after employees hired a detective to hack into mobile phones for stories.

Mockridge’s predecessor, Rebekah Brooks, was arrested in July as part of a police probe into hacking. Mockridge joined News International from News Corp.’s Sky Italia and he’s been tasked with overseeing changes that will prevent a repeat of the scandal, which led to the closure of the group’s most successful tabloid, the News of the World.

“It might be over-ambitious to say culture has changed entirely in six months, but I think there’s a change in structure and governance,” the 56-year-old Mockridge said.

The company’s Management and Standards Committeee was initially prevented from conducting its own internal probe into hacking at News International papers, Mockridge said in his written testimony to the inquiry. The Metropolitain Police Service, which had said an internal inquisition might prejudice the police investigation, relented just before he submitted the document dated Oct. 14 and released publicly today.

Read more…